HURRICANE
KATRINA: Indexed Quotations etc. | September 5, 2005
Scope
| FEMA |
Security
| Flood Prevention |
Political/Economic Fallout
FLOOD
PREVENTION:
ARMY
CORPS
OF
ENGINEERS,
LEVEES,
WETLANDS,
&
GLOBAL
WARMING
Researched
by
Douglas Drenkow, "Progressive
Thinking"
"Who on earth
could have known that Osama bin Laden wanted to attack us by
flying planes into buildings? Any official who bothered to read
the trellis of pre-9/11 intelligence briefs. Who on earth could
have known that an American invasion of Iraq would spawn a brutal
insurgency, terrorist recruiting boom and possible civil war? Any
official who bothered to read the C.I.A.'s prewar reports. Who on
earth could have known that New Orleans's sinking levees were at
risk from a strong hurricane? Anybody who bothered to read the
endless warnings over the years about the Big Easy's uneasy
fishbowl." -- Maureen
Dowd
"Our friends at
the Center for American Progress note the Office of Technology
Assessment used to produce forward-thinking plans such as 'Floods:
A National Policy Concern' and 'A Framework for Flood Hazards
Management.' Unfortunately, the office was targeted by Newt
Gingrich and the Republican right, and gutted years ago." -- Molly
Ivins
"The
president's declaration that 'I don't think anyone anticipated the
breach of the levees' has instantly achieved the notoriety of
Condoleezza Rice's 'I don't think anybody could have predicted
that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the
World Trade Center.'" -- Frank
Rich
"In 2004, Mr.
Brown led FEMA's thousands of dedicated disaster workers during
the most active hurricane season in over 100 years, as FEMA
delivered aid more quickly and more efficiently than ever
before." -- Official
White House Biography of Michael D. Brown, Under Secretary of
Homeland Security for Emergency Preparedness and Response
"Thousands
drowned in the murky brew that was soon contaminated by sewage and
industrial waste. Thousands more who survived the flood later
perished from dehydration and disease as they waited to be
rescued." -- National
Geographic Magazine October, 2004, in an eerily prescient
hypothetical worst-case scenario
"Since 2001,
the Louisiana Congressional delegation had pushed for far more
money for storm protection than the Bush administration has
accepted." -- New
York Times
"It would take
$2.5 billion to build a Category 5 protection system, and we're
talking about tens of billions in losses, all that lost
productivity, and so many lost lives and injuries and personal
trauma you'll never get over. People will be scarred for life by
this event." -- Alfred
C. Naomi, a senior project manager of the Army Corps of
Engineers for New Orleans flood control
"It appears
that the money has been moved in the president's budget to
handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose
that's the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees
can't be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make
the case that this is a security issue for us." -- Walter
Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish,
Louisiana, June 2004
"'The corps,'"
an Editor and Publisher article says, citing a series of articles
in The Times-Picayune in New Orleans, 'never tried to hide the
fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as
homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal tax cuts --
was the reason for the strain.' In 2002 the corps' chief resigned,
reportedly under threat of being fired, after he criticized the
administration's proposed cuts in the corps' budget, including
flood-control spending." -- Paul
Krugman
"Just plain
political bad luck that, in June [2005], Bush took his little ax
and chopped $71.2 million from the budget of the New Orleans Corps
of Engineers, a 44 percent reduction...that meant 'major hurricane
and flood projects will not be awarded to local engineering firms.
Also, a study to determine ways to protect the region from a
Category 5 hurricane has been shelved for now.'" -- Molly
Ivins
"The coastal
wetlands erode at a rate of 24 square miles a year and expose
south Louisiana to increasing danger...efforts to squeeze coastal
protection money out of Washington have met with resistance. The
Louisiana congressional delegation urged Congress earlier this
year to dedicate a stream of federal money to Louisiana's coast,
only to be opposed by the White House. Ultimately a deal was
struck to steer $540 million to the state over four years. The
total coast of coastal repair work is estimated to be $14
billion...the Bush administration also had proposed a significant
reduction in funding for southeast Louisiana's chief hurricane
protection project. Bush proposed $10.4 million, a sixth of what
local officials say they need." -- The
Times-Picayune
"...the Clinton
administration set some tough policies on wetlands, and...the Bush
administration repealed those policies -- ordering federal
agencies to stop protecting as many as 20 million acres of
wetlands. Last year...the Bush administration's policies had
allowed developers to drain thousands of acres of wetlands."
-- Molly
Ivins
"When unbridled
commercial development of delicately balanced environments like
the Mississippi Delta is bruited 'at the table', whose voice is
heard? ...the only voice that matters is that of the developers
themselves, and the elite investors who stand behind them."
-- Chris Floyd
"This may well
be one of the most active Atlantic hurricane seasons on
record." -- NOAA
director David Johnson, earlier this year
"Katrina is the
11th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, which began
June 1. That's seven more than typically has [sic] formed by now
in the Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico..." -- CBS
News (Saturday, Aug. 27, 2005)
"Meteorologists
think a decade-long trend of active Atlantic hurricane seasons
will continue this summer...During the 2004 season four hurricanes
battered Florida in the space of about six weeks, and another
hurricane lashed North Carolina's Outer Banks. The 45 billion
dollars (U.S.) in damages done by these storms makes the 2004
season the most expensive on record. And that figure doesn't
include millions of dollars in lost income for businesses forced
to close because of the hurricanes." -- National
Geographic News (June 1, 2005)
"The strongest
hurricanes in the present climate may be upstaged by even more
intense hurricanes over the next century as the earth's climate is
warmed by increasing levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Although we cannot say at present whether more or fewer hurricane
will occur in the
future with global warming, the hurricanes that do occur near the
end of the 21st century are expected to be stronger and have
significantly more intense rainfall than under present day climate
conditions." -- The
Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory of NOAA
Scope
| FEMA |
Security
| Flood Prevention |
Political/Economic Fallout
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